Joining
handcrafted materiality to the random nature of industrial production,
the work of German painter Thomas Kratz explores fundamental themes
from the history of art and of contemporary life, and the conditions
governing color, form and material. Both representational and purely
abstract; minimalist and flat, and yet layered, his paintings define
the boundaries between inside and outside, image and viewer, figuration
and abstraction, treating the unprimed, porous canvas as a membrane. In
addition, Kratz creates sculptures and performances in which everyday
items become objects of worship to be incorporated in his own
ritualistic, sometimes surreal games in space. Published to accompany
his solo show “Love” at the Bielefelder Kunstverein, Berlin, the book
details the new paintings and murals created for the exhibition,
investigating ways that painting can be presented in keeping with the
times and can form an intense dialogue with the architectural space.